

Robert Smith (The Cure) ha listado sus 30 canciones preferidas de la década de los años ochenta para la emisora inglesa Sirius XM. Me hace bastante gracia, en el buen sentido, que cite a bandas tan contemporáneas a The Cure, y a otras que no lo son tanto, al menos en estilo. Interesante. Pero, qué demonios, ¿desde cuándo se ha de parecer lo que escuchas a lo que tocas?
ABC - Look of Love
The Associates - Tell Me It's Easter on Friday
Bananarama and Funboy 3 - It Ain't What You Do (It's the Way that You Do It)
David Bowie - Let's Dance
Kate Bush - Cloudbusting
Cocteau Twins - Persephone
Christina - Things Fall Apart
D.A.F. - Sex Unter Wasser
Depeche Mode - Personal Jesus
Dinosaur Jr. - Freak Scene
Echo & The Bunnymen - Killing Moon
Peter Gabriel - Red Rain
Human League - Human
Jesus and Mary Chain - Some Candy Talking
Joy Division - The Eternal
Chaka Khan - I Feel For You
Madness - Return of the Lost Palmas Seven
My Bloody Valentine - Lose My Breath
Mel & Kim - Respectable
New Order - Everything's Gone Green
Yoko Ono - Walking On Thin Ice
The Pixies - Gigantic
The Pretenders - Don't Get Me Wrong
Prince - Starfish & Coffee
Psychedelic Furs - Heaven
Siouxsie & The Banshees - Dear Prudence
Soft Cell - Tainted Love
Sugarcubes - Birthday
Suzanne Vega - Small Blue Thing
Tom Waits - In the Neighborhood
Puedes irte al famoso atolón de las islas Marshall y reírte del resto de idiotas que no han ido todavía. Puedes rescatar videojuegos del pleistoceno y divertirte un buen rato. Puedes ponerte a parir hijos, echar raíces y después dejarlo todo. Puedes reírte con Chiquito y Leslie Nielsen juntos for the first time ever. Puedes leer la prensa y pensar “¿en serio hay alguien que lea ésto?"Puedes comprarte un bonito libro y olvidarte de todo. Pero para todo lo demás, para cuando ya nada de eso te produce ninguna satisfacción, usa la tecla mágica.
Algo está ocurriendo y quiero saber qué es. Llevo 48 horas viendo a gente caerse en
El segundo, en plena Gran Vía. Un business-man frente a mi, al otro lado de la calle, a punto de cruzar. El semáforo se pone en verde y, de repente, se desploma. La mujer que cruzaba conmigo me mira, flipada. Se acerca, me acerco, el tipo se levanta, hace la típica mirada estúpida de “estoy bien, ha sido un tropezón tonto” y sigue su camino.
El tercero, un señor muy mayor, en plena tienda del centro barcelonés a hora punta. Sin aire acondicionado. Todo muy previsible, sí, pero el hecho de que se desplomase mientras le preguntaba algo a una cajera me dejó atónito. Así, en pleno diálogo con la chica, “Oiga, sabría usted decirme dónde…CATAPLÁS!!!” Seguridad, ambulancia, un mareo, un achaque, un traspiés y para casa. (llegué a pensar que la pregunta que quería hacerle era: “Oiga, ¿sabría usted decirme dónde puedo quitarme el implante alienígena que me han puesto en el cogote y me obligará a caerme en 5 segundos?”)
La cuarta, una chica en medio del Paseo Marítimo de la ciudad condal. Pasea junto a otra a ritmo pausado y plaf, se cae. Sin tiempo a rescatarla en el aire, sin tiempo a reaccionar de ninguna manera. Su amiga se quedó hablando con el aire durante dos nanosegundos, su compañera cayendo a cámara lenta al arcén.
Lo juro, esto ha pasado en 48 horas. Yo he buscado la cámara oculta sin suerte. ¿Alguien sabe algo? ¿Están llegando los ultracuerpos ya (y yo con estos pelos)?
Nota 2: ¡Que se caiga, que se caiga, que se caiga!
Extraño fin de semana. Agradable, relajante, tíovivo. Todo empezó con The Do el jueves y Gigi después. Un viernes de pesadilla con final feliz y sueños de casas enterradas bajo el desierto, desvencijadas a lo Ballard. Luego maté a un ser maligno...
...y me comí una galleta con forma de personita. Ñam, ñam. Después la nueva de Van Sant con agradable sensación de déjà vu y envidia. A medianoche “Fight Fire With Fire” y teenage kicks como hacía tiempo no recordaba. Luego reflexiones de domingo morning y, finally, amigos. De nuevo, fiebre hikikomori y más Melville. Y una semana que comienza sin avisar, un cumpleaños que se anuncia idem. Y un descubrimiento:
Aquí Flynn con la Bardot. No sabe nada el tío...
"Thousands of years ago the first man discovered how to make fire. He was probably burned at the stake he had taught his brothers to light, but he left them a gift they had not conceived of, and he lifted darkness off the earth. Through out the centuries there were men who took first steps down new roads, armed with nothing but their own vision. The great creators, the thinkers, the artists, the scientists, the inventors, stood alone against the men of their time. Every new thought was opposed. Every new invention was denounced. But the men of unborrowed vision went ahead. They fought, they suffered, and they paid - but they won. No creator was prompted by a desire to please his brothers. His brothers hated the gift he offered. His truth was his only motive. His work was his only goal. His work, not those who used it, his creation, not the benefits others derived from it. The creation which gave form to his truth. He held his truth above all things, and against all men. He went ahead whether others agreed with him or not. With his integrity as his only banner. He served nothing, and no one. He lived for himself. And only by living for himself was he able to achieve the things which are the glory of mankind. Such is the nature of achievement. Man cannot survive except through his mind. He comes on earth unarmed. His brain is his only weapon. But the mind is an attribute of the individual, there is no such thing as a collective brain. The man who thinks must think and act on his own. The reasoning mind cannot work under any form of compulsion. It cannot not be subordinated to the needs, opinions, or wishes of others. It is not an object of sacrifice. The creator stands on his own judgment. The parasite follows the opinions of others. The creator thinks, the parasite copies. The creator produces, the parasite loots. The creator's concern is the conquest of nature - the parasite's concern is the conquest of men. The creator requires independence, he neither serves nor rules. He deals with men by free exchange and voluntary choice. The parasite seeks power, he wants to bind all men together in common action and common slavery. He claims that man is only a tool for the use of others. That he must think as they think, act as they act, and live is selfless, joyless servitude to any need but his own. Look at history. Everything thing we have, every great achievement has come from the independent work of some independent mind. Every horror and destruction came from attempts to force men into a herd of brainless, soulless robots. Without personal rights, without personal ambition, without will, hope, or dignity. It is an ancient conflict. It has another name: the individual against the collective. Our country, the noblest country in the history of men, was based on the principle of individualism. The principle of man's inalienable rights. It was a country where a man was free to seek his own happiness, to gain and produce, not to give up and renounce. To prosper, not to starve. To achieve, not to plunder. To hold as his highest possession a sense of his personal value. And as his highest virtue, his self respect. Look at the results. That is what the collectivists are now asking you to destroy, as much of the earth has been destroyed. I am an architect. I know what is to come by the principle on which it is built. We are approaching a world in which I cannot permit myself to live. My ideas are my property. They were taken from me by force, by breach of contract. No appeal was left to me. It was believed that my work belonged to others, to do with as they pleased. They had a claim upon me without my consent. That is was my duty to serve them without choice or reward. Now you know why I dynamited Cortlandt. I designed Cortlandt, I made it possible, I destroyed it. I agreed to design it for the purpose of seeing it built as I wished. That was the price I set for my work. I was not paid. My building was disfigured at the whim of others who took all the benefits of my work and gave me nothing in return. I came here to say that I do not recognize anyone's right to one minute of my life. Nor to any part of my energy, nor to any achievement of mine. No matter who makes the claim. It had to be said. The world is perishing from an orgy of self-sacrificing. I came here to be heard. In the name of every man of independence still left in the world. I wanted to state my terms. I do not care to work or live on any others. My terms are a man's right to exist for his own sake."
La figura de Rand es FASCINANTE. Como un Wittgenstein pasado de vueltas, Rand fagocitó toda la filosofía y decidió descartar la que no le aportaba nada (Platón, Kant, Hegel, Marx, Nietzsche) y adaptar la que sí le interesaba (Aristóteles y poco más) para su propio corpus philosophicus, el Objetivismo. El mensaje de la película, en la que Gary Cooper encarna a un insobornable, independiente y orgulloso arquitecto, viene a decir que el hombre, -cada hombre-, es un fin en sí mismo, no el medio para los fines de otros. Debe existir por sí mismo y para sí mismo, sin sacrificarse por los demás ni sacrificando a otros para sí mismo. La búsqueda de su propio interés, propio racional y su propia felicidad es el más alto propósito moral de su vida. Es fácil comprender que en el mundo en el que nos movemos, que tiene una tendencia irresistible por colocar a sus individuos en grupos y colectivos, que no sólo no entiende ni acepta el individualismo, sino que ha conseguido convertirlo en el más grave pecado contra la solidaridad y la tolerancia, se hable poco de Ayn Rand y prácticamente se haya olvidado la existencia de sus obras. Pero Rand merece salir del olvido, Rand debe ser reeditada y leída en todas las escuelas, institutos y universidades. Y cuando uno está del colectivo hasta las narices, pues llega Rand y le lanza un cable a través del tiempo y el espacio.
El discurso final de Gary Cooper (hasta el momento en que se rodó la peli -1949-, el más largo de la historia del cine), es épico. Aunque la propia Rand (que seguía el guión y el rodaje del film al milímetro) se enfadó con Cooper por su falta de entusiasmo y su floja interpretación (Cooper contaba ya 47 años y ciertamente estaba algo tocado), la parrafada es memorable.